Friday, February 06, 2009

Yesterday, a
display of profitable incompetence.made the day arduous but reasonably
lucrative; today it was like shelling peas. 45 minutes to pocket a
little over 4 hunjie, then a return bout just after 3 p.m. which made a
hunjie in three minutes.

With the week ending on a high note, another 5 hunjie taken
off the Assembled Various in the SPI today, and with your
beloved GT
able to toot away to his heart's content about the fulfilment of his
forecast of a 5% bounce in the DAX... a short rant is warranted.

The topic of today's wild-eyed ravings is the idea that a
great deal of the law foisted on us by your political overlords have no
victim whatsoever; they justify themselves based on the (fatuous) claim
that the law in question is promulgated to 'reduce risk'.

For examples, we need look no further than the road laws.

Speeding
may be associated with some minuscule proportion of
accidents (as I understand it, 'excessive' speed plays a part in about
4% of all motor fatalities), but to have a blanket limit - which takes
no account whatsoever of driver ability - is to penalise people who are
at zero risk of losing control over their vehicles.

We already have copious tort law which enables people to seek
redress if some dill speeds and hits them. To have a 'strict
liability' offence which applies irrespective of the ability of the
driver, is simply tyranny.

It's all very well to bleat about some or other kiddie who got
smeared by a driver going too fast... but what was the stupid kid doing
on the road? Where were its parents? Why are today's children so stupid
that we have to 'go slow' around schools? Don't their parents teach
them that cars are big, fast, and - above all - hard?

But take it one step further.

Let's say I was on, say, a Suzuki RG500R (a classic 2-stroke
maniac-chariot which will wheelstand in 4th).

Let's say I was on a
completely empty Tullamarine freeway at 3 a.m., and I
decided to open it up. An RG500 is capable of about 300km/hr, but let's
say I was a big girly sissy so I kept it tame at 180-200.

Who - apart from me - is at risk? Nobody, that's who. But if a
'safety camera' (thanks, Orwell) snaps a blurred image as I clean-line
a corner, I would get treated as if I had endangered somebody.

I have said before that I think speeding is dumb - mostly
because it achieves nothing (it doesn't save enough time on any
sensibly-sized trip to be worth doing). But whether it is sensibe or
not, is not the point -
people have a right to do stuff, and to pay the consequences
(if any) only if they
stuff up.

Instead we have a strict-liability
offence which claims to be about pre-empting some putative disaster,
and that is just wrong.

Likewise drink-driving
law: if you are drunk behind the wheel,
but nobody has yet been hurt, on what basis are you fined and/or
arrested? On the basis that your odds
of harming a third party have increased?

That sort of idea is straight out of Minority Report.
Minority Report was a dystopian
piece
of sci-fi; doubtless part of the background to that story is
that the State got the 'precog' law passed by scaring
housewives and then assuring them that precogs would help keep
their kiddies safe.

Drug law, licensing, restrictions on what you can do to
your own property... the State claims a right to interfere in all these
things.

On what basis? Where is the contract between you and the
State, that gives some bunch of parasites who live off your taxes the
right to stick their oar into any aspect of your life that they decide they
need to regulate?

Now speaking of the contract (for those who believe the stupid STUPID idea
of a 'social contract' which requires obeisance to the State).

What sort of contract can be varied by one of the parties,
unilaterally, with no means of redress or right of refusal or
wothdrawal by the other
party?

Well, the answer is easy: a slavery contract.

What sort of contract permits one party to acquire
compulsorily, the goods (or, in the case of conscription, the person)
of the other party, with the other party having no right of redress,
refusal or withdrawal?

Again - a slavery
contract.

And finally, under what sort of contract does one party assume
the right to deem the offspring of existing
counterparties to be subject to the obligations of the
contract, with no right of withdrawal or refusal?

You've probably worked out the answer... slavery.

Show me the document that justifies the State compelling me to
do anything,
and show me my signature on it. If such a document does not exist, then
the State obtains its rights solely as a function of having more armed
goons than I have. That is, it is purely the fact that the parasites
who run the State think that their monopoly on organised violence gives
them the upper hand.

Well, I've got news for the State: it might have more armed
goons, but when people like me decide that we have had enough, then politicians start
dying, and armed goons get to flail around in the aftermath. You don't
need superior firepower, or superior numbers. You just need
the will: politicians then die in large numbers, and governments fall.

Some years ago, I sent a letter to the ATO and to the office
of the Prime Minister (the chief parasite), declaring that his
'government' was failing to fulfil what I considered to be their
contractual obligations, and if the breach was not remedied forthwith,
I would terminate our arrangement. The breach centred on the obligation
of a counterparty to abide by the law, and the fact that at the time
the government
was engaged in a flagrant criminal conspiracy to invade a sovereign
country
(Iraq).

I asked for the legal doctrine under which the Commonwealth
government claimed ownership of me - that is, claimed the right to do
with me as it saw fit, or to bind me to its laws - and received no
response.

I'll dig that letter out and post it at some stage... needless
to say, the government didn't bother responding, but since that date I
consider myself as having absolutely no obligations towards any
government whatsoever.

But back to this idea that you ought to have laws that
interfere with people's lives when the only likely casualty is the
'offender'.

If we are to have such laws based on the idea that it will
pre-emptively prevent carnage, then I have a proposal for a new law
which will save, oh, about 250 million lives a century...

Anybody
who becomes a politician should be put to death (preferably strangled
with their own entrails) and then fed to pigs.

One last thing... who was it who - for lo these many years -
has warned that QAN
was a hollow log that constantly needed to raise new capital? You will
have heard of the űber-analyst
that I'm thinking of... he's really handsome (some would say HOT,
although others say simply 'gorgeous'), and likes bacon and eggs.

Anyway... while credit markets were willing to lend to any
dill with a bit of patter, QAN could hide the fact that it's
'profitability' was coming from accounting treatments of things, not
from operations. I mentioned this in 2002 and got accused of trying to
undermine 'an Aussie icon' (oh PLEASE).

Major Market Indices

The broad market - the All Ordinaries (XAO)
- rose pretty strongly, registering a gain of 37.2 points (1.10%),
finishing
at 3409.8 points. The index hit an intraday high of 3430.4 at 10:41 am,
while the low for the day was 3372.6 - set at 10:00 am Sydney time.

Total volume traded on the ASX was 1.02bn units, 6.4% below
its 10-day average of 1.09bn shares.The ASX's daily listing of all
stocks included 988 different 3-letter FPO's which traded (i.e., had
non-zero trade volume). Of these, 408 issues rose, with volume in
rising issues totalling 600.9m units; there were 350 declining stocks,
which traded aggregate declining volume of 287.1m shares.

Of the 485 All Ordinaries components, 226 rose while 161 fell.
Volume was tilted in favour of the gainers by a margin of 2.1:1, with
525.12m shares traded in gainers while 247.54m shares traded in the
day's losers.

The Index that forms the cash basis for the SPI Futures - the S&P/ASX
200 (XJO)
- managed a solid gain, adding 43.3 points (1.26%), closing out the
session at 3471.9 points.

The "heavy hitters" of the Australian market - the ASX
20 Leaders (XTL)
- performed solidly, in moving up 29.3 points (1.39%), closing out the
session at 2140.5 points.

Among the 20 big guns, 14 index components finished to the
upside, and 6 lost ground. The stocks which make up the index traded a
total of 126.36m units; 14 index components rose, with rising volume
amounting to 101.03m shares, while the 6 decliners had volume traded
totalling 20.64m units. The major percentage gainers within the index
were

Stockland (SGP),
+$0.26 (9.39%) to $3.03 on volume of 9.4 million shares;

Newcrest Mining (NCM),
+$1.73 (5.74%) to $31.88 on volume of 2.6 million shares;

Wesfarmers (WES),
+$0.50 (3.33%) to $15.50 on volume of 4.9 million shares;

Westpac Banking Corporation (WBC),
+$0.48 (3%) to $16.50 on volume of 5 million shares; and

Foster's Group (FGL),
+$0.13 (2.54%) to $5.25 on volume of 3.7 million shares.

On the less salubrious side of the big-cap fence, the
following stocks were the worst-performed within the index:

Macquarie Group (MQG),
-$0.74 (3.07%) to $23.39 on volume of 1.3 million shares;

Rio Tinto (RIO),
-$0.65 (1.37%) to $46.75 on volume of 3.9 million shares;

Woodside Petroleum (WPL),
-$0.35 (1.08%) to $32.00 on volume of 2.3 million shares;

Origin Energy (ORG),
-$0.13 (0.92%) to $14.00 on volume of 1.7 million shares; and

National Australia Bank (NAB),
-$0.14 (0.75%) to $18.50 on volume of 3.2 million shares.

The ASX Small Ordinaries (XSO) advanced
by half a percent, adding 7.9
points (0.50%), closing out the session at 1587 points.

Among the stocks that make up the Small Caps index, 105 index
components finished to the upside, and of the rest, 73 closed lower for
the session.

The 208 stocks which make up the index traded a total of 244.29m units:
volume in the 105 gainers totalling 111.87m shares, with trade
totalling 92.98m units in the index's 73 declining components. The
major percentage gainers within the index were

Market Breadth

GICS Industry Indices

Among the 11 industry indices, it was green across the board,
as every sector managed to keep its head above water.

The best performing index was Property Trusts
(XPJ),
which added 27.7 points (4.08%) to 706.1 points. The 21 stocks which
make up the index traded a total of 211.97m units; 15 index components
rose, with rising volume amounting to 165.35m shares, while the 3
decliners had volume traded totalling 27.8m units. The major percentage
gainers within the index were

Stockland (SGP),
+$0.26 (9.39%) to $3.03 on volume of 9.4 million shares; and

Centro Retail (CER),
+$0.00 (5.45%) to $0.06 on volume of 2.8 million shares.

Second in the index leadership stakes was Materials
(XMJ),
which gained 140.4 points (1.62%) to 8820 points. The 46 stocks which
make up the index traded a total of 187.3m units; 31 index components
rose, with rising volume amounting to 149.68m shares, while the 10
decliners had volume traded totalling 32.45m units. The major
percentage gainers within the index were

Incitec Pivot (IPL),
+$0.11 (5.79%) to $1.92 on volume of 34.3 million shares; and

Newcrest Mining (NCM),
+$1.73 (5.74%) to $31.88 on volume of 2.6 million shares.

The bronze medal for today goes to Consumer Staples
(XSJ),
which climbed 86.6 points (1.44%) to 6110.6 points. The 13 stocks which
make up the index traded a total of 29.74m units; 9 index components
rose, with rising volume amounting to 16.79m shares, while the 4
decliners had volume traded totalling 12.95m units. The major
percentage gainers within the index were